Win probabilities: WGC-FedEx St. Jude Invitational

Don’t discount Tiger’s role at the Presidents Cup

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Here are nine tidbits from the second round of the Genesis Open that gamers can use tomorrow, this weekend or down the road. Be looking for the Emergency 9 shortly after the close of play of each round of the tournament. PAIN OR GAIN These were the top-five picked golfers in the PGA TOUR Fantasy One & Done presented by SERVPRO: With 15 players stranded, Round 2 will not be completed until tomorrow morning. The cut is not official yet and neither will be the places used in the descriptions below. I’ll use the current suspended leaderboard as a point of reference with the understanding it can change tomorrow. As it stands, all five above will be playing the weekend with Mickelson leading the group at T26. Yikes. Hey, at least DJ rallied and made the cut! There’s hope! You See, L.A.! Former UCLA Bruin and Southland native Patrick Cantlay looks to add win No. 2 to the season as he shares the clubhouse lead after his first two rounds. The Shriners champion pointed out today that when he was at UCLA they practiced at Bel-Air Country Club and didn’t play Riviera much. He’s looking to join John Merrick (2013) as the only Los Angelinos to win this event. He’s leading the field in strokes-gained: approach-the-green and putts per GIR. Gee, Mac! Last week after round two at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, I wrote about Graeme McDowell shooting 80 at Spyglass after 71 on Pebble Beach. He opened this week with 69 and followed it with 66 to currently share the lead in the clubhouse on 135 (-7). He opened         69-70 last year before 71-77 on the weekend (67th). He also shot 66 in 2009 en route to T41, his best finish in five tries before this year. Best of luck to both of you who played him this week in the PGA TOUR Fantasy One & Done presented by SERVPRO. Not Finished Yet Sam Saunders continues to pique the interest of gamers for a second year in a row at Riviera Country Club. The first-round leader from 2017 has three more holes to tame Saturday morning that could see him possibly lead after 36 holes this year. He’s tied with Cantlay and McDowell currently even with a double on his card Friday. His 11 birdies over his first 33 holes have been impressive. … Scott Stallings backed up his even-par round Thursday with a monster Friday, as he’s currently five-under-par with two holes remaining. He’s been trending properly (T23, 7th) the last two weeks and is rewarding gamers who have jumped on board. Momentum Rafael Cabrera-Bello, making his first start at the Genesis Open, rattled off six birdies in his first seven holes on Friday. The Spaniard moved up 50 places to T11 after signing for 67 (-4). He keeps reinforcing his class regardless of prior course knowledge. … German Martin Kaymer is on his debut as well as posted a bogey-free 67 (-4) to move up 71 spots to T15. … One of my favorite fantasy players, Austin Cook, is following suit of the Ryder Cuppers above. He moved up 90 spots after a magnificent 66 (-5) that included a whopping seven birdies against two bogeys. Quick learners! Night Shift Top 10 selections in the PGA TOUR Fantasy Golf presented by SERVPRO Daniel Berger and Marc Leishman are going home early regardless of what happens early Saturday morning. Berger, the sixth-most popular selection and Leishman, No. 10, need to be subbed out if they are currently occupying a spot in your live, line up. Berger now has MC in two starts in this event while Leishman continues his all-or-nothing run with his fourth MC in nine tries. Berger will get another long look from gamers next week at PGA National. He lost in a playoff to Padraig Harrington in his first try in 2015. Streakers K.J. Choi had never missed a cut here in 17 previous tries in his career. His 74-74 this week ends that marvelous streak. … Southern California native Cameron Tringale was perfect in seven tries with five checks cashed for T25 or better. He’ll join Choi in traffic after 74-73. … Brendan Steele snuck in the back door (72-71) for his seventh weekend in a row at Riviera. … Brian Gay’s streak of top-10 finishes ends at two weeks in a row with 74-75. Wood You? Tiger Woods checked in at No. 15 in the most-selected player department in the PGA TOUR Fantasy One & Done presented by SERVPRO. He was also the 13th-most selected in the PGA TOUR Fantasy Golf presented by SERVPRO. His only stat category inside the top 50 this week was two-hole driving distance. He made bogey on 12 of his 36 holes and also recorded a double. This course doesn’t have any water but PGA National does and that’s where he’s heading next week. He’s never won that event either. Study Hall Jim Herman is shutting it down for a while, according to this tweet. Weekly and season-long gamers also read some interesting news today about Stewart Cink: Nicholas Lindheim WD during round 1 with an illness. It’s his second in-tournament WD this season. He also withdrew at Shriners after round one last November. … Jim Furyk returned to competition and MC after 73-73.

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Cameron Smith won the Sony Open in Hawaii on Sunday for his second PGA TOUR title, and first individual win. He also won the 2017 Zurich Classic of New Orleans with Jonas Blixt. Smith, 26, moved to fifth in the FedExCup after defeating Brendan Steele in a one-hole playoff a Waialae. RELATED: Sony Open win means ‘that little bit more’ | Winner’s Bag | International Team announces Australian bushfire relief donation  Here’s a closer look at the best stats from Smith’s win in Hawaii: 1. BOUNCE BACK: Two holes into the tournament, Smith didn’t look destined for the winner’s circle. He bogeyed his first hole Thursday, then made a triple-bogey 7 on the next hole. He is the first player since at least 2003 to win after playing the first two holes in 4 over. ShotLink, which began in 2003, records the starting hole for each round. 2. ON A ROLL: Smith played his next 16 holes in 4 under to shoot 70 in the first round. His putter helped him dig out of that early hole. He gained +4.8 strokes on the greens Thursday. He went 4 for 5 from 10-15 feet – TOUR players made 30% of putts from that range last season — and sank putts of 21 and 15 feet. It was the second-best Strokes Gained: Putting round of Smith’s career, surpassed only by the +5.0 he gained in the second round of this season’s Shriners Hospitals for Children Open. Contrast that to the final three rounds this week, when Smith didn’t sink a single putt from outside 10 feet. He did hole nine of 11 attempts from 7-10 feet in the final three rounds, though. That’s a 82% make percentage. 3. STEELE’S SUNDAY: Steele started the final round with a three-shot lead and looked to have the tournament in hand after holing a bunker shot on the par-3 11th. He played the final seven holes in 2 over, though. He bogeyed 13 and 17 to sign for a final-round 71. Steele led the field in Strokes Gained: Putting through three rounds but was last in the field in that statistic Sunday. He was just 1 for 5 from 4-8 feet in the final round and didn’t make a putt outside 6 feet. 4. WEBB’S CLOSE CALL: Webb Simpson could have joined the playoff with a birdie at the par-5 finishing hole, but he missed the fairway right and couldn’t reach the green. It was another close call for Simpson. In his last 11 starts, he has four runner-up finishes and this third-place finish. His worst finish in that stretch is T30. Simpson’s worst finish in three starts this season is T7 at the Shriners Hospitals for Children Open. He finished runner-up in his previous start, losing a playoff to Tyler Duncan at The RSM Classic. Simpson is fourth in Strokes Gained: Approach this season and 12th in Strokes Gained: Putting. Since the RBC Canadian Open – the start of this 11-event stretch – Simpson has been the second-best putter on TOUR and fourth in Strokes Gained: Approach. 5. MORE TO COME FROM MORIKAWA: Simpson finished runner-up to Rory McIlroy at RBC Canadian Open. That’s where Collin Morikawa arrived on the scene as well, finishing T14 in his pro debut. There are some other similarities between the two. Both are strong iron players who have shown a penchant for going low. Morikawa is second on TOUR in Strokes Gained: Approach since the RBC Canadian Open (see above). Their shared consistency also is worth noting. They’ve both made 16 consecutive cuts, the second-longest active streak on TOUR (Tommy Fleetwood leads that category with 31 in a row). Morikawa finished T21 this week but he held the first-round lead with an impressive 65 in tough conditions. It was his 18th round of 66 or lower since turning pro at the RBC Canadian Open. That’s two more than anyone else on TOUR in that span. Simpson is second in that category.

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